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00:30Corsica. Some say it is one of the most majestic islands on earth. They also say a certain magic lives
00:38in these lands, that whole villages are populated with witches, and that the fog hides errant spirits. With myths, legends,
00:48tales, and fantasies, the island is brimming over with treasures and mysteries.
00:55What then about the story of Rommel's treasure? Since the end of World War II, wild rumors have spread through
01:02the French and foreign media, alluding to a legendary treasure of religious objects, gold coins, silver chalices, and rolled-up
01:11canvases.
01:12Is it a true story or mere legend? What can we make of this amazing story, which for more than
01:1970 years has turned Corsica and its coast into an immense playground for renowned divers, local figures, and adventurers from
01:27around the world?
01:31I decided to travel to Corsica to investigate this odd tale. I decided to head out on the hunt for
01:38Rommel's treasure.
01:40Corsica.
01:41Corsica.
01:48Corsica.
02:09June 3, 1948, it was in Germany in the city of Trier, located in the French occupied zone
02:16at the end of World War II.
02:17Judicial Police Inspector Jean-Paul Schrerer received a visit from a strange character
02:23named Peter Flieg, the man claimed to be Czechoslovak.
02:28He states that in September 1943, while working as a diver at the port of La Spezia in Italy,
02:34he was requisitioned by SS officers to complete a confidential mission in Corsica.
02:41In his testimony, Peter Flieg declared that he was charged with acquiring several crates,
02:46located in a convent in the heights of the city Bastia, and transporting them to the port
02:51to be loaded onto speedboats.
02:54The six crates, he said, were full of precious stones, gold coins, and silver cups.
03:00He claimed to have sunk the six crates himself, just a few kilometers south of Bastia, towards
03:06the mouth of the Golo.
03:21A few years later, he went back on his testimony, saying he didn't immerse the crates south of the city,
03:27but rather to the north, toward the Cape Corse, and that in fact they fell from the speedboat
03:32during an attack by American cruiser.
03:35For the rest of his life, Peter Flieg would contradict his statement, as if to cover his
03:40tracks while remaining the sole lead for all those hoping to enter in the treasure hunt.
03:47He claims to be the only survivor of the expedition.
03:52His companions were tried and executed on their return to Italy, and thus the only person who
03:59knows where this bounty, dubbed Rommel's treasure in the 1950s, lies.
04:141943, already 10 years since Adolf Hitler took power in Germany and ended the Weimar Republik.
04:21He made a pact with their Alpine neighbor, Benito Mussolini, and the two powers set out
04:26to conquer surrounding territories.
04:29Most of Europe was swung into chaos or crashed under the Nazi boot.
04:33But in 1943, the Third Reich and Fascist Italy suffered heavy losses, especially in North
04:40Africa, with the arrival of Anglo-American troops.
04:44Even Marshal Erwin Rommel, the famous Desert Fox, commander of the legendary Africa Corps,
04:50had to retreat.
04:55Why, then, is the treasure associated with Rommel?
04:59Celebrated as an expert military strategist, could he also have been a looter, who amassed
05:05a booty over his multiple campaigns?
05:08My first stop was Ajaxio, the first freed French town, liberated on September 8, 1943.
05:15I have an appointment with Jean-Noel Aiki, head of the Museum of the Corsican-resistant Zonza,
05:21in the Alta Roca.
05:22He's passionate about the subject.
05:31It comes up rather often.
05:33Every time journalists run short on news, they try to crack the case again.
05:38It last happened in 2011, recently.
05:47This dates back to the 1980s, but that, for example, is a Paris match from September 20,
05:541952, which has a version of the story from the famous SS diver Peter Flagg given when he
06:04approached French army intelligence, saying, I know where the treasure is.
06:13Nobody believed him at first, but more and more ever since, and he wanted 50% of the cut,
06:20which was pretty huge given that the estimated value is about 30 billion.
06:30Anyhow, now the name Rommel's treasure is somewhat inaccurate, because as far as we know, Rommel
06:36never stole anything.
06:38Given certain details that have emerged, it would seem that it's the Negus treasure, allegedly
06:45stolen by the Italians, and then nabbed from them by the Germans.
06:50They managed to get it out before the Afrika Korps surrendered in Tunisia on May 13, 1943.
06:57They must have evacuated it, along with the troops, en route to Sardinia.
07:03With the Afrika Korps retreat, the Negus treasure should have passed through Corsica to reach
07:08Italy and finally Germany.
07:11It's a very long trip by boat, but everything is possible in war.
07:17We headed toward the Departmental Archives to try to learn a little bit more about the
07:22affair and its lead player, Peter Flagg.
07:27The story of Rommel's treasure made French and European headlines in the 50s.
07:33In some articles, Peter Flagg suggested that Rommel wanted to use this treasure to found
07:38the famous July 1944 coup against Adolf Hitler.
07:44The hypothesis was the Negus treasure, but people also spoke of property confiscated from
07:49Jews in Tunisia.
07:51Flagg added to the end of his story, saying that the crates were in a truck overturned aboard
07:55the German speedboat.
07:58Again, another version.
08:00Yet he always explained that he was ready to go back and look for it in exchange for
08:05a share of the loot, about 10 million dollars, to see him into old age.
08:11A strange character, this Peter Flagg.
08:14Yet in 1948, in correspondence between the Ministry of Finance of Paris and the Parks Service
08:19in Corsica, it is noted that he made a good impression.
08:22The Parks Director of Ajaccio wrote that nobody doubts Flagg's sincerity or technical competence.
08:29It is even noted that if the treasure were to be found, the boxes would be stored in the
08:34vaults of the Bank of France in Bastia, then repatriated to Paris.
08:39The French government allocated one million francs to the search, and Peter Flagg finally arrived
08:43in Bastia in August 1948.
08:53Next I found documents stating that at the end of that year, he was still actively searched.
08:58And then, deportation proceedings initiated against him by Maurice Papon, the local prefect at
09:05the time.
09:21What happened in Bastia in 1948?
09:24The state-funded search was planned to last eight days.
09:27But they ultimately continued for more than a month, from August 23 to October 5.
09:34Every morning, Peter Flagg took off from the old port, closely monitored by an engineer
09:40named Lobenberg, and headed out toward the mouth of the Golo.
09:46But on October 7, 1948, Flagg was sentenced by the Bastia Criminal Court to two months in
09:52prison for the mysterious theft of a pair of binoculars.
09:57Upon his release, he disappeared, and all trace of him was lost for ten years.
10:02Some even claimed he was murdered.
10:09In an unpublished interview from the early 90s, he reflected on the 1948 episode.
10:19At first I was diving to the south of the River Gallo with a Corsican boat chartered by the
10:25French government.
10:25It was an old diving boat, with a weak pump.
10:28At that time we didn't have modern equipment, so we could dive to about 30 meters.
10:33I knew that the Secret Service was plotting against me, so I decided not to help.
10:38I stopped looking around the mouth of the Golo.
10:40I pretended to look.
10:41I would dive, and then come up.
10:50Actually, I really wanted to go farther north to cap course, because I knew the odds for
10:54us would be much better there.
10:57So at night I went with a team of guys and searched near Erbelunga.
11:02We had an old boat and an old diving suit.
11:05We found the place and came back two or three days later.
11:08On the boat we had two German prisoners who pumped for the divers, and three Frenchmen.
11:14It was at the end of September 1948.
11:18It happened during the second expedition up north, toward Michinagio.
11:24During my third diving attempt, I saw the truck by total chance.
11:28It was really a fluke.
11:30It could have happened to anyone.
11:32The truck lay upside down at the bottom of the sea, with the crates strewn around.
11:38If you go there, you or anyone else would see it.
11:42It happened after a few diving efforts, which followed the map drawn in 1943.
11:47But in 1948, we were being monitored by the French, and it was impossible to raise the crates.
12:05There, you're in the Marana suburbs.
12:07Right, yeah.
12:09At the time, there was nothing there.
12:11No houses.
12:12There was absolutely nothing here.
12:16I'm here with Toni Coloni, one of the few people who met Peter Flagg in September 1948.
12:22He was just 20 years old at the time.
12:28His uncle, a coral fisherman in Bastia, had diving equipment.
12:33Toni would witness the two men's encounter.
12:42So, they called my uncle to get a quote for renting equipment, and he had no idea what
12:46it was about.
12:47He was asking questions like, how long will you rent it for?
12:51Are we going far away?
12:53How deep are we diving?
12:54And they replied, it's a state secret.
12:57OK, a state secret.
13:04Two days later, here comes Flagg.
13:07And that's when he discovered that the state secret was Rommel's treasure.
13:17We needed to know if Flagg was really a good diver, so we did some tests at the mouth of
13:23the
13:23Bastia port, where it's 20 or 30 meters deep, just to see how Flagg would act when we gave
13:30him the kit, and to put on the collar and the helmet, and see if there were any communication
13:36issues.
13:40On one side, my uncle saw that he reacted like a pro.
13:44For Flagg, the equipment was good, so it was no problem.
13:50But the two men soon had problems.
13:52Tony's uncle wasn't chosen by the French state, and Peter Flagg found out he wouldn't
13:56be granted a percentage, just a day wage.
14:00The two men decided to join forces to find the treasure themselves.
14:09The formal contract wasn't with my uncle, but with the company from Marseille.
14:14And the arrangement with Flagg had no legal basis either.
14:18This arrangement was rather informal and marginal.
14:34We came here many times, three or four times, always asking to dig 40 meters deep.
14:42The man would always say, OK, and would always come back saying, we didn't find anything.
14:48After quite some time, the man says, you have to find and pick up the treasure at night.
15:04The singularity pushed my uncle to take a stand and say, let's stop.
15:09He said, we might get the treasure, but we might risk our neck trying, and then we'll
15:14have nothing, or if we don't risk our neck, which means we call the police, they'll find
15:20the treasure, and we'll have nothing.
15:22I thought his reasoning was valid on some level, even smart.
15:30Whether off Cap Corse or near the mouth of the Golo, Tony Coloni reared firms that Peter
15:35Flagg claimed they had found the location of the treasure.
15:38The cases were there, little was needed to get their hands on it, but the both of them
15:46also claimed they didn't dare see it through because they thought they were being watched
15:50or monitored.
15:52They feared for their lives.
15:54The story of Rommel's treasure then hit headlines, and its location was reported as various places
15:59around Corsica, especially in Bonifacio, at the extreme south of the island.
16:06It is true.
16:07This is where German troops stationed during their evacuation to Sardinia in September 1943.
16:13So why not the treasure too?
16:15The true history met fiction in 1962, when director George Lautner took inspiration from the story
16:22for his film, The Eye of the Monocle.
16:30George Lautner's team chose Bonifacio for the exteriors of the spy movie The Eye of the Monocle.
16:35The cast included Paul Maurice, Maurice Birault, Robert Dolbon, and Claude Cogon.
16:45In the movie The Eye of the Monocle, these actors play opponents in search of the famous
16:50Himmler treasure, one billion in gold bullion submerged off the beautiful island.
16:54The screenplay was inspired by the story as told by Peter Flagg.
16:58A former German soldier named Hector Schlumpf is the only survivor of an expedition that
17:03in 1944 submerged a fabulous cargo of gold in the caves below Bonifacio.
17:09French, Russian, and British spy agencies run after the lead with an incredible manhunt
17:15through the streets of the upper town.
17:18I have an appointment with Jean-Claude Albertini.
17:21He was in the movie, and still remembers it as an amazing experience.
17:27Jean-Claude Albertini, Jean-Claude Albertini, Jean-Claude Albertini, Jean-Claude Albertini,
17:28I was a stand-in, I would replace Paul Maurice, so that he didn't get tired, since he had
17:35to go up and down Seine Roche toward Robert D'Albon, named Chick in the film, who was his
17:42commander.
17:46I was on Lautner's set almost 15 days.
17:49The place lent itself to the story.
17:51There was the sea, the cliffs, and there was this Draganato cave, nicknamed the Dragon Cave.
18:06Most of the population was invited to take part in the film.
18:10There were a lot of extras.
18:12In terms of other artists, there was Paul Maurice, Robert D'Albon, Paul Merci, and there was
18:20also Maurice Biraud.
18:22But the guys were the well-known ones, and the stuntmen at the time.
18:29Were people still talking about Rommel's treasure in the town?
18:32We were because there were a lot of divers, and coral divers, but they never found anything.
18:37And even if they did, they wouldn't have admitted it.
18:55Jean-Claude then offered that I come with him to see one of his old friends, who also
18:58played in the film.
19:02He had pictures that could interest me.
19:04In the eye of the monocle, they're not looking for Rommel's treasure, but for Himmler's treasure.
19:09Another infamous member of the Third Reich, head of the SS and the Gestapo.
19:14I thought back to a document that I had seen in Ajaccio, mentioning that Peter Flake had
19:19his blood type tattooed under his left armpit.
19:22A hallmark of SS members.
19:25A strange coincidence that the film's writers would have also known this detail.
19:37We came by because my dad had those pictures on the counter, you know, from when we made
19:42the film.
19:42We put them there.
19:44Took them off.
19:46Let's just say we moved them when we redid the shop.
19:49It's been a while.
19:50We meant to put them back after.
19:53Ah, yes, I remember.
19:55OK, so your dad's not here?
19:57He's at home.
20:00We set a date for the next morning, but ultimately the famous photos weren't even from the Eye of
20:05the Monocle.
20:07That was the last I'd learned about it.
20:09On the other hand, the rumor that Rommel's treasure was submerged near Bonifacio was ever-present.
20:18So of the many tourists who invade the city every year, wouldn't some of them be coming
20:23in search of the treasure?
20:25I want to join them, to see if any of these creeks, coves, or caves might still contain
20:31a clue that could set me, too, on the right path.
20:44Bonifacio is known as the pearl of the Mediterranean.
20:48Traditionally, sailors came here to seek refuge from violent winds and to rest up before breathing
20:54the elements again.
21:00At the extreme tip of Corsica, it feels like it's the end of the world and the adventure
21:06is palpable.
21:15Stragonata Cave, or the Dragon Cave, is one of the island's most famous natural attractions.
21:23If you look up towards the sky, it's like a reflection in a mirror, the outline of Corsica, inverted.
21:32It's hard to doubt that anything is possible here, that myths are born and remain in this
22:00place.
22:02At the foot of the Bonifacio cliffs, I thought back to the events of September 1945.
22:08During the repatriation of German troops from Sardinia.
22:13That may have been when Rommel's treasure arrived in Corsica.
22:17Local historian Michel Terce granted me a meeting not far away, near Cape Pertussado.
22:25Everything in Bonifacio is French military.
22:28That there is typical.
22:31You have a turret there, with lookout and shielding to protect the gun.
22:35In small niches there was ammunition.
22:38And you even can see remaining camouflage paint on the concrete walls.
22:42And so it was taken by the Germans in 1943?
22:45On September 8, 1943, the Germans took this position in Bonifacio to help in the repatriation
22:51of troops from Sardinia.
22:53The Germans disarmed the Italians, replaced them with these guns, and organized a naval
22:59evacuation of all the Germans remaining between the port of Bonifacio and the northern Sardinian
23:04coast.
23:05In 10 days, they evacuated 30,000 people, 4,500 vehicles, and 5,000 tons of material.
23:14That's incredible.
23:16Which is immense.
23:19The Italians were kept as prisoners in the German barracks.
23:25We know that these Italians were in Bonifacio on November 11, 1942, during the invasion
23:30of the Free Zone.
23:40The location is quite extraordinary.
23:42The ports are just over there.
23:44You can see the houses.
23:45You see Saint-Thérèse-Gouleur.
23:47And the boats would sail out from there and re-enter behind the peninsula over there.
23:54Traffic was day and night.
23:56Meanwhile, the Germans had gunners here to protect against hypothetical intervention from
24:02the Allies, since you never knew what the Allies would be doing.
24:05The Allies never planned to take Corsica, except for French General Giraud, who decided to lend
24:12a hand to Corsican patriots who revolted on September 8.
24:16He's famous for landing in the port of Ajaxio, but only in Ajaxio, Germans.
24:23Germans were still in Bonifacio.
24:25How far is that from Sardinia?
24:26Thirteen kilometers.
24:28We're very close.
24:29On a day like today, we can even see it.
24:33Bonifacio.
24:36If there was a treasure from Sardinia, that's where it would have been for sure.
24:41People say it could be on Bonifacio.
24:43Do you know where they claimed it is?
24:45People say all sorts of things.
24:47Some said in the well of Saint Bartholome, for example, in the barracks.
24:51Can we see it from here?
24:53No, we can't.
24:54The cave is located in the main cliff over there, about two-thirds of the way down the
24:58peninsula.
24:59The well goes down vertically from the barracks, down to the sea level.
25:08And can you tell me about the other rumors?
25:13It's the same.
25:15Overboard in transit from Sardinia.
25:21Why?
25:22The Germans definitely sank plenty of junk in the port, including a lot of shells, that's
25:28for sure.
25:29But that the Germans also dumped their treasure or hid it there knowing that they weren't
25:34going to stay?
25:35No, it doesn't add up.
25:37But then why did Germans come to Corsica after the war, looking for sunken treasure?
25:42And why did French intelligence also conduct that investigation?
25:46There's no smoke without fire, as they say.
25:56I had to leave Bonifacio and its remarkable scenery to head to Bastia.
26:01If the treasure exists, it has to be there.
26:09Following the road along the eastern plain, I thought about those convoys of German soldiers
26:14evacuated from Sardinia.
26:17They only stopped over in Corsica.
26:19They took off again from Bastia and other small ports on the island to rejoin the frontlines
26:24in Italy against a recently landed Allied invasion.
26:27Among these convoys, there would have been a truck carrying gold and silver, driven by soldiers
26:32of the Winsenschutz Kommando, a motorized unit operating directly under Himmler in the
26:38Afrika Korps, whose mission was to plunder banks, museums and Tunisian-Jewish communities
26:44of their property, and which arrived to find Bastia in complicated circumstances.
26:52In the end, just a few hundred men were taken prisoners by the Corsican resistance and General Giro's
26:59Moroccan troops.
27:02But the city was devastated by Allied bombing, before its liberation on October 4th, 1943,
27:08when it became a forward operating base for U.S. Naval and Air Force troops in the re-invasion of
27:14Europe.
27:23In the heart of the citadel, I meet Sylvain Grégory, a historian specializing in the
27:29Second World War.
27:33After the war, the island was very conducive to such myths, precisely because of the immediate
27:38post-war environment, in which nobody had perspective on the recent events.
27:43For example, the chronology of Corsica's liberation was completely unknown at the time.
27:49Whereas nowadays, when you try to draw a match between Peter Flieg's story with the chronology
27:54of the Corsican liberation, you see very clearly that the story doesn't hold water, that it's
28:00full of nonsensical and completely inexplicable parts.
28:09So it was fertile ground, both for a lack of perspective, and also because, after 1945,
28:15people really did find war treasures, bounty from German looting throughout the capitals of Europe.
28:23One example is the Goering art collection.
28:26So there was this dynamic at the time that made it easy to believe that Peter Flieg's story,
28:31or at least to believe in its likelihood.
28:33Only seventy years later do we realize that we're talking in the realm of myth,
28:38not to mention the testimony of a pathological liar.
28:50There's a very specific date that is supposed to clarify the story, but which actually leads to other questions.
28:56Flieg's stories are always like that.
28:58The more precise you get, the more questions arise and the less the answers agree with the previous ones.
29:04September 16th is a very late date, if we assume that Rommel's treasure is Rommel's treasure.
29:09That is, war booty collected by the Africa Corps during campaigns in Libya and Tunisia.
29:16And then we have to ask, how come this treasure ended up in Bastia?
29:20The Africa Corps continued until May 1943.
29:24Rommel was recalled to Berlin in March 1943.
29:27What happened to the treasure between May and September 1943?
29:31The Germans retook Bastia on September 13th, and the evacuation began immediately after that.
29:37So we can imagine that if there were a million Reichmark treasure lying around,
29:41it would have been evacuated immediately.
29:49They would have had plenty of latitude to evacuate it, given that they were evacuated immediately.
29:53thousands of people and tens of thousands of tons of equipment.
29:56It's a bit the snake eating its own tail.
29:58We know that there is a treasure, we're almost certain of where it came from,
30:01but no one knows why it passed through Corsica.
30:04And when it did pass through Corsica, something went wrong and it sank off the island.
30:18Peter Flake's account hasn't convinced our historian.
30:22Some parts align with historical fact, but no hard, reliable evidence that could further my investigation.
30:30Is it all just a myth?
30:32I decided to go to the convent of Saint Antoine in the heights of Bastia, which seems to match Flake's
30:38description.
30:40Saint Antoine is revered for his protection, but also for sometimes helping to find lost objects.
30:51I know there are various legends of the treasure floating around Bastia.
30:55I am from Bastia. I'm 48 years old.
30:58I've lived here for years, and just two years ago I heard this story,
31:02claiming that Rommel brought the treasure here, to the Saint Antoine convent.
31:07Some versions of the legends say he later left the convent, along with the treasure,
31:11while others, especially the town folk, think there might be something still here.
31:20The legends of Rommel's treasure make me laugh, since we've done a lot of work around the convent to upkeep
31:26and repair it.
31:29Then people talk about treasure hidden in the gardens on the other side where there's the Saint Antoine castle,
31:34which was the gardens of the convent.
31:38And when they built the Saint Antoine castle buildings,
31:41I never heard anything about someone randomly digging up Rommel's treasure with a machine or a tractor.
31:55It's normal for people like you, coming from the continent and unaware of anything,
31:59to be a little intrigued by the story.
32:01But it just makes the brothers laugh.
32:04No, I think it's one of those famous urban legends, as they say,
32:08a product of our collective imagination.
32:11But you ask why I'm not susceptible to it?
32:13Why aren't I looking for this thing that could radically change my life?
32:17It's building castles in Spain, making figures of imagination, it doesn't help anyone.
32:22It's just chasing wind or chasing sand.
32:35Chasing legends and myths can fill our daily lives with comfort, dreaming of what could be possible.
32:48People who met Peter Flake in 1948 certainly expressed doubts as to his sincerity,
32:54but they also recognized that some of his comments contained truth.
33:02There are some details of his testimony about what he saw while diving in 1948 that he could not have
33:08invented.
33:11Wartime lies never miss, but I nevertheless got the impression that he was a sincere person.
33:20One year a fisherman came to me because his net had got cotton on something down in the relative flats,
33:25and he couldn't figure out what it was.
33:27So like I do every time, I went out with him to retrieve his equipment and find what would generally
33:31be a shipwreck.
33:38I approached the wreck, I moved about the little bits of the iron structure that remained,
33:44and there I realized that it was actually an overturned truck.
33:49What is interesting is that only then, from various documents and information,
33:53did we learn Rommel's treasure had been in a truck just like this, with dual wheels on the back,
33:59and more or less the same size.
34:04At that moment we had to reconsider everything.
34:08Even today, the truck is still in the same place.
34:16Peter Flake again resurfaced in the 60s, when he admitted that his real name was Walter Koerner,
34:22and that he bore the SS tattoo because he was sent, by no choice of his own,
34:28with an SS unit to the Russian front.
34:31After the war, when he was interned at the camp in Dachau, Germany,
34:36an SS officer entrusted him with a map with the coordinates of where to look.
34:41Cap Corse.
34:50No matter what version of the story, fishermen, adventurers, renowned divers,
34:56and plenty others are trying their luck on the treasure hunt.
35:02So it follows.
35:04A dowser claimed to be able to find the treasure,
35:07if only the French government provided him an accurate map of the coast.
35:12Then there's the constant presence of the boat, Romare made,
35:16funded by a rich American.
35:18In 1963, there was also an expedition launched by Lord Kilbraken
35:23and the U.S. billionaire Edward Link.
35:26But for every official expedition, supplied with cutting-edge search technology,
35:32how many clandestine and hazardous searches have there been?
35:36One thing is certain, an announcement of the discovery of Rommel's treasure
35:40always draws crowds and media.
35:47On alert, police divers went to see the scene guided by someone
35:51who discovered what they already believed to be Rommel's treasure.
35:54On their return to Portovecchio, the divers commented on the results.
36:01Police divers found an anchor, a ring, and a few shells dating from the war,
36:06as well as a box, which according to them was just a disemboweled tank,
36:11but no treasure at all.
36:14Everyone's certain of that.
36:18Such gold fever also seems to cause drama.
36:21The press reported the mysterious death of divers.
36:26The same for Daniel Kidor, an alleged former SDECE agent,
36:32the French Anti-Espionage Service.
36:35In the early 90s, he claimed he met Peter Flague
36:38and conducted three underwater searches, but without success.
36:42Michel Carriga, former Olympic shooting champion and amateur diver,
36:46often went with him.
36:49A former spy drowns off Brando.
36:52I was quite surprised when I found out he was a spy.
36:58I was quite astonished.
37:00This is a photo on the boat.
37:02I had just finished fishing, so I'm still suited up.
37:06And behind is Daniel.
37:11A strange character, this Daniel Kidor.
37:14Still a strange character.
37:17I don't know.
37:18I always thought Daniel Kidor was someone who just wanted to have a pleasant holiday.
37:25He was an excellent diver.
37:26But I never imagined that he had that kind of past.
37:31That surprised me.
37:35We dove all those wrecks.
37:38We saw them on the magnetometer, but no one would know what was down there.
37:43After checking, we realized that these were the wrecks of airplanes or boats.
37:52Now they have cameras they sent down to the bottom.
37:55We didn't have that at the time.
37:59Normally, he always came here.
38:00When he came back to Korska, in my opinion, because he didn't have the means to pay for a hotel.
38:05One day, I found out he was staying at the Telassa Hotel, just next door, without telling me.
38:12So he called me in the morning and he said,
38:14I'm here. I'm going diving with friends. Do you want to come?
38:17As usual, I said yes.
38:19I was surprised to see him at a hotel, especially one that's three stars.
38:23Very expensive.
38:30My ship was docked in Tonga, and they were on the cap.
38:35I wanted to join up with them, but I couldn't get my engine started.
38:38While I sat in the port waiting for the repairman, they headed out.
38:42It wasn't until late in the morning that a friend of mine called me and told me,
38:47Daniel Kidder drowned.
38:52That was a terrible surprise, and I had some regret over not being there,
38:57because maybe I could have done something. It really shook me.
39:00He was a hell of a diver, and for him to drown?
39:07The police wouldn't let me see his body.
39:09I don't know what became of the policemen who oversaw that.
39:12I also don't know what became of the other two divers who were with him.
39:16Something definitely happened.
39:18I don't want to put it the wrong way, but I would have liked to know what happened.
39:24Yeah, it's definitely strange.
39:27I always have a doubt. It's annoying to have a doubt like that,
39:31and know that if my engine hadn't failed, I could have been there, where I was needed.
39:40Maybe I wouldn't have been able to do anything.
39:44Maybe I would have drowned too. Or could have been drowned.
39:48Yeah, that too.
39:50The gendarme went to Telassa to get his things, and they found a ton of money and guns.
40:00Did Daniel Kidder die because he had found the coveted treasure?
40:03They say he often died on the P-47 wreck, located offshore of the Miomo Cemetery,
40:09where they are remains of an American fighter plane, identical to the one which may have overturned the truck containing
40:16crates of Rommel's treasure.
40:18I made an appointment with Stéphane Le Gallais in the Citadel of Bastia.
40:23An enthusiastic diver and underwater photographer, he also knows the whole story.
40:29He offered to take me to the site, because even if it's now frequented by divers, some mystery still remains.
40:36Our meeting was set for the next morning at the port of Toga.
40:45I set off with Tony, Jean-Guy and Antoine, a designer who is working with Stéphane on a reference book
40:52of wrecks in Corsica.
40:54Of course, their history of the P-47, Miomo and Rommel's treasure are included.
41:02On the boat, Antoine also wanted to have the cameraman and me, now part of history.
41:08We drove along the coast, to the north, towards the Miomo Cemetery.
41:25When I started diving, I pretty quickly started exploring wrecks, photographing and filming them.
41:31And of course, with the P-47 in Miomo, associated with Rommel's treasure, I wanted to understand more of its
41:37history.
41:40But after reading and researching, I realized that the treasure might never have even existed.
41:45It could just be a legend.
41:48On one hand, it's in the Straits of Bonifacio.
41:51On the other, it's in a well at St. Bartholomew.
41:55Then they think it's up on a mountain.
41:58The treasure myth has gotten a little muddled.
42:08Whenever I'm diving around the airplane, or around Bastia and the cap, there's still always a little voice saying,
42:13what if I stumbled on those crates, or truck full of crates?
42:17It's still present.
42:19I was believed in destructive lives thatats, something was still alive to pretend.
42:25To be sure that all the Earth that leaves mention, it's alwaysavais a lot of black exposure to weather.
42:37So, I started to rumors thatstein Booklet has being gone.
42:38The 치 pivotal is yet to notice to say to me sometimes, something more like that.
42:48Inguardation, it's the most powerful instruments.
42:48It was saved upon my mind that I am dying to rule.
42:50It's a magic moment, finally seeing the famous wreck of the P-47, which for more than 70
42:57years has rested on the sandy bottom.
43:11Although it may not be where the boxes are located, it's a moving and magical sight.
43:16It is here that Peter Pfleg and many men after him dove in search of the treasure.
43:23First they found the wreckage of a plane.
43:26Not far away, this should be a truck, wheels upturned, and then, close by, six metal boxes.
43:37My parents come from a fishing family, so we were always hearing about Rommel's treasure.
43:44It's definitely well known around here.
43:47Whenever we're underwater, especially when diving around shipwrecks, we're always keeping an eye out.
43:57We are like, I'm going to get my hands on it.
44:00Personally, I dive to please other people, to share this passion of mine.
44:04That's what attracts me, more than any other treasure.
44:11When we're out in deep water, we know that we could stumble on anything at any time.
44:15But in general, we dive more for others than for something.
44:19That's rather the diver's philosophy.
44:27The only treasure we find is the flora, the fauna, and the wrecks.
44:32That's the treasure.
44:59There's still a few places I have to check out, including a truck that's
45:03turned upside down, pretty deep down.
45:06Is it the famous truck, which Flieg pushed off a barge back then, full of crates of bullion
45:11and precious stones?
45:13Could be.
45:14It's a deep dive and takes commitment.
45:17You have to prepare for it and make sure the conditions are right.
45:21I need people around me to get it ready, but it's in the works.
45:25Maybe that's the day I'll hit the jackpot.
45:31I thought back to what Michel Carriga told me a few days ago.
45:35If you've never dove, you can't know what it feels like in the deep water.
45:41The weightlessness, wholeness, and peace.
45:44It's another world that you have to earn.
45:47A world that can swallow secrets and mysteries forever.
45:52Corsica's history is rich with stories of treasures lost at sea, buried in the hollows
45:57of the mountains, or in the heart of the Maquis.
46:00Could Rommel's treasure be just one more legend?
46:03My last step led me to the heights of Kassinka, a small region just a few kilometers from Bastia.
46:09The small, traditional villages cling to rocky ridges, a window into medieval Corsican architecture.
46:15This is where Stéphane Orsini lives, a historian and archaeologist.
46:23Corsica could be called treasure island, or mini-treasure island.
46:28Given there have been discoveries from every era, a researcher or archaeologist wouldn't
46:32say treasure because it's rather disruptive to their quiet scientific process.
46:38It makes people believe that there is something to find, and that archaeologists can find it
46:42before anyone else.
46:49We fight a lot in Corsica, and elsewhere as well.
46:52There's a scourge of hunters, people simply searching for the purpose of uncovering treasure
46:57or something remarkable.
46:58For us, the real treasure is a scientific treasure.
47:05Of course, once the object is out there, when it's being displayed to the public, then we
47:10might talk about treasure because it helps get the public interested.
47:14We'll easily attract more people to the museum if the exhibition is presented as treasure,
47:18jewelry or coins, rather than old shards of broken pots.
47:22Of course, that's when it's right to lean a little heavier on the treasure and value
47:27side.
47:28But otherwise, on the archaeological level, every item is important to the research.
47:33Even a tiny insignificant shard can be just as important as a beautiful gold coin struck
47:37on the other side of the Mediterranean.
47:49Many of these myths are based in stories and legends, because there is always a certain
47:53truth to these legends.
47:55For example, from the Middle Ages, many small villages had proverbs based in oral tradition,
48:00built over the centuries in which we refer to treasures in certain places, and suggest
48:05that if we just dig there, we'd find great pots of gold.
48:08Obviously, there aren't any pots of gold there.
48:11Often, they do mark archaeological sites.
48:19We're in the heights of Kacinka, an area stretching from the mountains down to the
48:24Tyrrhenian Sea, and approximately three kilometers from the mouth of the Golo, as the crow flies.
48:31In ancient times, the area was home to the great city of Mariana.
48:36There are many ancient shipwrecks to be found here, and it may also be the place where Rommel's treasure lies.
48:45A quick anecdote.
48:47During the excavation to locate the ancient port of Mariana, which was the ancient city at the mouth of the
48:52Golo, we had to get permission from the landowner.
48:57So we went and explained to her what we wanted to do, and she said yes, because she had been
49:01briefed all about it.
49:03He was someone who was very familiar with history and archaeology, yet still, when to leave, she came up to
49:09me and said,
49:09All fine and well for your first century ancient boat, but if you find Rommel's treasure, we're splitting it.
49:22My journey comes to a close.
49:24The story of Rommel's treasure remains an enigma to me, still raising many doubts and questions.
49:38And yet, every year, the inhabitants of Bastia note suspicious vessels meticulously calming the coast from the mouth of the
49:45Golo out to Cap Corse.
49:49So sometimes it resurfaces, but then it disappears again. It's a bit like the Loch Ness monster, you know, someone
49:56sees its head and disappears.
49:58There are spies from RSS, Corsican Mafia, they're all wrapped up in it.
50:04It's definitely been found. It's just nobody's shouting it from the rooftops that they found something.
50:10Some people say it's been found, but I don't think so.
50:16We've all found the treasure. We all have a little piece of something shiny at home.
50:21Before you can say that Rommel's treasure doesn't exist, at least explore all the potential places it could be,
50:27then maybe you can say Rommel's treasure doesn't exist.
50:29But you still have to keep in mind, a great deal of it could be pure fantasy.
50:39Rommel's treasure is one of the last Nazi war booties that has not yet been found.
50:44But the treasure hunt continues, and people talk and they dream.
50:49As Brother René said, it's human nature to have one's feet on the ground and head in the stars.
50:59My investigation stops here. I didn't find the fabulous treasure either. At least for now.
51:15Sous-titrage Société Radio-Canada
51:17Sous-titrage Société Radio-Canada
51:33We'll see you next time.
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